cherry cobbler cards with keys

I admit I was not completely won over by the Parisian Blossoms Designer Series Paper when I first saw it in Las Vegas last November. I am ludicrously influenced by shiny things, and I thought that a lot of this paper simply was not shiny enough. And especially this paper! Not a foil accent to be seen! But I have given it an honest chance:

This is mostly-simple card construction: Cherry Cobbler cardstock for the base, a 4″x5.25″ piece of the designer series paper, the sentiment from the Forever Blossoms stamp set–black ink on Whisper White, a little bit of vellum underneath. Scrounging around for suitable ribbons I found a bit of old Cherry Cobbler seam binding ribbon and some red twine or thread or whatever we are calling these things now.

I also tried a vertically-oriented variation, above, with the sentiment from the Timeless Tropical stamp set, but the same basic idea, especially the three keys from the Bird Ballad trinkets. (I also added in a few of the champagne rhinestones to this card.)

I am of the opinion that it is just no good to stick an embellishment on your card and send it off–no, embellishments ought to be used with generosity, with profusion! (That, or hoarded far past timeliness and use, which has, I admit, been my normal practice with these things.) I got the Bird Ballad trinkets last spring and I used some of the flowers, but I confessed myself puzzled at these keys. Keys? Birds? Yes, anyone can see that they naturally go together, I did not think. But when this similarly-themed paper turned up in the spring catalog, I thought of how well they worked together!

The only downside to this sort of abundant use of embellishments? Well, I used 3 keys on the first card, and 3 keys on the second card I made. Those Bird Ballad trinkets come with 6 keys. Now I’m reduced to making these plain cards with no key trinkets at all!